Saturday, October 1, 2011

FULL TEXT: Hobarton, Tasmania –
Elizabeth Cahy, p.h., was charged with a “common assault” on Mrs. Elizabeth
Lewis on the 19th instant, by “then and there biting a portion of her right eye
brow off.”

The prisoner pleaded guilty, but
standing in her own defence.

Mrs. Lewis stated, that the prisoner
was in her service; at 10 o’clock on the night of the day mentioned, witness,
who keeps a public house, (the Freemason’s Arms) went to clear the Tap room,
when the prisoner prevented her; witness told her to go to her room, but she
refused, and rushed witness against a cask in her bar; she afterwards seized witness
by her hair, and pulled some of it out by the roots, and, then, bit a piece of
her eyebrow off.

A witness, named Margaret Davidson,
who was stopping at Mr. Lewis’ on the night in question, corroborated Mrs.
Lewis’s testimony, and stated, that the prisoner’s conduct was very violent,
and that Mrs. Lewis was bleeding profusely from theeye brow.

Dr Smart deposed to the nature of the
wound, which was about an inch in length, and half au inch broad; a portion of
the flesh had been torn off which Mrs. Lewis showed to witness: he sewed up the
wound which was not of a dangerous character.

Mr. Burgess said, that the Bench
adjudged the prisoner guilty; her conduct towards her mistress appeared most
brutish, and it was only in October 1854, that she received a sentence of nine
mouths’ imprisonment for a similar offence. She was now sentenced to eighteen
months’ imprisonment withhard labor.